This disease is so rare that even doctors don’t know what causes it.
If not properly cared for, pregnant women can spread terrible diseases to their babies in the womb, and one of them is congenital syphilis.
Syphilis is a cruel disease for babies. A newborn with syphilis can be born dead, or die within a few days, develop deformed bones, a large liver, blindness, deafness, or meningitis. And it is the moms who infect their babies without knowing it.
The problem that is being presented in the US is that more and more pregnant women are infected with this infection who are not receiving treatment, and therefore are mothers of babies born with syphilis. The latest figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that the number of babies born with this disease has doubled in the past 5 years.
Sexually transmitted diseases have increased in the country in a worrying way, and syphilis is no exception. While the disease has grown 10 percent in the past year in the United States, the number of babies born sick increased by nearly 50 percent. In adults, it is treatable with antibiotics.
An untreated mother with syphilis has an 80 percent chance of passing the condition on to her baby, and 40 percent of those babies are stillborn or die soon from the infection. California, Arizona, Texas, Louisiana and Florida account for 70 percent of cases of sick children.
Pregnant women should have at least one syphilis test during the nine months and see their doctor if it is positive. In states where the prevalence of the disease is highest, the test should be performed multiple times during pregnancy.